This form of mining links mercury and blood, as well as high levels of deforestation, to human trafficking and the devastation of river basins with forced labour. Profits from this are generally higher than other sectors of illicit economies, such as drug trafficking (that is why some of these agents have migrated to the illegal mining business).
With the Venezuelan crisis, the national government has intensified its participation in gold mining processes, but to date it has not reactivated its formal industrial mining enclaves, let alone been able to install and operate new ones.
This implies that for the extraction of the new tons of gold that have been presented on television and in written and digital media – remember theimages of President Maduro with several gold bullions in Miraflores Palace– the government ends up getting involved in and being complicit of these complex global gold networks. This is done despite the announcements that state-led extraction is only done through small miners organized by the state who do not use mercury and who practice environmentally friendly methods.
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